Twice the night before Tedivus…

November 16, 2013

Ted, what’s new?

Why thank you for asking. In a word: lots. But in reality, the more things change, the more they stay the same, so in fact, maybe there’s not all that much new. Let’s discuss and then you can decipher it “new” or not.

I often check the photo reel on my phone to see what I’ve been up to lately. Based on this lengthy research, I will venture to say I’ve rocketed to California via airplane, lead a cycling tour all throughout the blissfully serene Marin, Sonoma, and Napa counties of California — highlighting only the finest things in life. Namely scrumptious food, exquisite wine, stellar hotels, and fantastic people. Ahh, and unparalleled riding to complete the quad-fecta.

I then stuck around Napa for one more week where each day was outstanding, but with the highlight arrived in the form of Tedivus. Or #Tedivus, if you followed along on the social media. The first annual and extremely festive Tedivus occurred Tuesday November 12, 2013 and is the result of me being an American on a very international cycling team and therefore being occupied during the day upon which Thanksgiving does actually occur. Thanksgiving, of course, is a holiday paying homage to something for which every nation in the world besides Americans has nothing to celebrate. Other countries also don’t have Pilgrims in the capital-P sense of the word, which equates to no Thanksgiving in my book. Anyway, Tedivus is something mildly akin to Thanksgiving, but not quite the same. For example we bring in the day with a good dose of holiday cheer, plus one massive bike ride – preferably the first five hour ride of the new season, as well as a flightless fowl that simply MUST be brined in maple syrup and then smoked all day on the smoker.

By “flightless fowl” we are of course referring to a turkey breast. And not flightless because it’s dead, but because it’s wingless. You see, I went to the meat market (which conveniently is a fowl and fish market as well) in search of turkey breasts, per the recipe. The friendly meat/fowl/fish/butcher-man pointed directly at the “turkey breast” in the massive refrigerated display that separates the two of us. Although right in front of me, I didn’t see it, because instead of looking for the standard breast like so, it looked like a massive wingless bird like so:

When it finally dawned on me that this bony, wingless carcass was that of a “turkey breast”, I suppose I was at first slightly startled, but a subsequent 12 seconds of deep thought deemed this form of breast like more fun than roasting individually butchered breasts and I went with it.

I digress. A very merry Tedivus ensues with the aforementioned bike ride and maple syrup brined bird. There’s also no fewer than six people present, preferably at least one-third you’ve never met. There should be at least one bottle of wine per person; there are no airing of grievances, instead, there are superficial compliments paid during dinner to one another. There should be a chalkboard for non-permanent graffiti, and most definitely one notPumpkinPie. That is, a pumpkin pie, baked in a baking dish, sans crust, and with four eggs rather than the two you’ll find on a standard recipe. This gives it wonderful mouth feel and a more custardy taste.

And once Tedivus has come and gone, you wait with bated breath for the next one, which may or may not be November 12, 2014. That’s for the Tedivus forefathers to decide. More importantly, you should drive to southern California, or SoCal as the cool kids are calling it, and embrace the tryptophan-induced week with more bike riding with friends before shuttling off to Europe.